CityCyclingEdinburgh was launched on the 27th of October 2009 as "an experiment".
IT’S TRUE!
CCE is 16years old!
Well done to ALL posters
It soon became useful and entertaining. There are regular posters, people who add useful info occasionally and plenty more who drop by to watch. That's fine. If you want to add news/comments it's easy to register and become a member.
RULES No personal insults. No swearing.
A letter to the Courier in response to another by Dr David Martin - presumably of (recently) this parish?
It's the usual rant, nothing new.
He mentions being cursed by a group of four 50+ year old cyclists for not getting out of the way on a pavement.
Do these things actually happen in the realy world?
"cursed by a group of four 50+ year old cyclists"
"Do these things actually happen in the realy world?"
YES!
I'm afraid they might have been wearing Lycra too.
"cursed by a group of four 50+ year old cyclists"
Pretty much a daily occurence on the canal tow path, I would think (well, maybe not four at a time...).
I often think to myself that I never really see much red light jumping and certainly not pavement cycling, but I'm prepared to believe that either I just don't pay much attention to the sides of the road or it's some kind of selective blindness.
"Respect has to be earned and black people have a long way to go in that department"
Thought not. In my opinion, even the thought that respect has to be earned (by random chunks of society who are basically unrelated) signals a lazy, weak, or prejudiced mind.
I guess we'll just have to agree not to agree to disagree here, Dave, but I still think your choice of groups in the word swap is flawed, although the concept itself is spiffy.
Using 'drinkers' and 'teetotallers,' for example, doesn't bump into my objection because the entry condition is voluntarily chosen.
Or 'Motorists'...
Or 'pedestrians'?
@Uberuce - do you think that's an important distinction?
I was thinking about this just now, because it would be ironic to discuss prejudices without reflecting on one's own meta-prejudices, but I'm not sure self-selection is that significant.
For instance, skirting carefully around Godwin's Law, people voluntarily profess particular faiths - many have recanted their catholicism or protestantnicity, many others choose to affirm it - but I don't expect we would classify sectarianism as less prejudiced than racism just because the entry condition is voluntary.
Then I was thinking, OK, at least you can't be of more than one race or one faith*, whereas cyclists are overwhelmingly also drivers and pedestrians all bundled into one. But if anything, that makes the prejudice illustrated by the OP /even more/ of a failing, because the subject of the prejudice is even less clearly defined.
That is, when people stir up hatred against cyclists because they don't know what red lights mean, they are being even more stupid than face-value because cyclists are actually more likely to have passed their driving test than the "average person" in the UK (usual caveats apply).
</endblabber>
* yes, simplifying again
It seems valid enough in the sense that the letter writer is saying that until ALL people using bicycles refrain from ANY bad behaviour, NONE of them should be afforded any respect. In fact, they should continue to be killed and seriously injured in the same numbers, if not more, until they've learned their lesson. The fact that it tends to be different people who cycle on the pavement and die on the road is immaterial.
@Dave - Yes. It would have been somewhat odd if I didn't but posted anyway.
I have in mind a modelled EEN foamer, who thinks cyclists are either:
A) Irresponsible overgrown children who aren't allowed to drive because of previous convictions, lack of money or inability to pass the test which as we all know is unimaginably hard.
2) Eco-vegan-sustain-o-tossers who just want yet another excuse to preach at hardworking decent folk.
D) Lycra-sheathed speed demons who don't care about anything except their new fastest time.
I know that's rubbish, you know that's rubbish, but my hypothetical foamster doesn't agree. Can't get it into the head that people an awful lot like them cycle too, or else they'd not be a foamer. He or she thinks that the root cause of cycling is being One of the Above.
Hence my preference for a voluntary category that they know first hand is not the root cause of behaviours worth foaming about. In Scotland, the bevvy is pretty good bet here.
My model may, of course, be utter guff.
A) Irresponsible overgrown children who aren't allowed to drive because of previous convictions, lack of money or inability to pass the test which as we all know is unimaginably hard.
2) Eco-vegan-sustain-o-tossers who just want yet another excuse to preach at hardworking decent folk.
D) Lycra-sheathed speed demons who don't care about anything except their new fastest time.
That's most of CCE covered then. ;-)
You forgot:
X) Bespoke vintage clad hipsters who lean against fashion accessory fixies on street corners whilst sipping skinny latte/Red stripe/absinthe.
Oh, the foamers don't know about them*. Which is probably good for their blood pressure, poor wee poppets.
*Or us. Do love me a latté.
Although does skinny mean it's not got lots of cowudderlard in it? Deal's off, if so.
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